


expediencies

by spookykingdomstarlight



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Angst, Character Death, Execution, Future Fic, Guilt, Hugs, Leading Revolution Against Former Lover, M/M, Past Character Death, Unhappy Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-23
Updated: 2018-11-23
Packaged: 2019-07-28 18:56:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,447
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16247798
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spookykingdomstarlight/pseuds/spookykingdomstarlight
Summary: Poe turned and looked at the soldiers behind him, gestured them back even further. He wanted as much privacy for this as he could get. If he could’ve shot the camdroids from the sky, he would have done that, too, but they were recording this for posterity, for the politicians back home, for the people who wouldn’t believe this nightmare was over until the bogeyman was dead.





	expediencies

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Artemis1000](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Artemis1000/gifts).



Poe’s boots cracked against the duracrete as he strode across the airfield toward the shuttle that grew ever closer to the Resistance base. He was exquisitely aware of the camdroids hovering at his back, their impassive regard a hot, heavy weight against the back of his neck. There would, he knew, be no coming back from today. Then again, he probably always knew. The minute Ben Solo declared himself Kylo Ren, it would always have ended up this way. Or perhaps, if Poe had been less unlucky, the reverse, so that this wasn’t his duty to discharge. But there were no other options for them, not a single one, and if Poe’s hands shook and his palms sweated and he hated Ben and most of all himself for having to be in this position at all, then this was just the cost of living in a galaxy at war that was finally giving birth to peace.

All births came at a price and blood was the most beloved of currencies.

Birth, life. It was all, he’d come to realize, very unfair.

His mother had tried to teach him that life was just and good as long as just and good people fought for it, but Poe had learned that was a lie the minute he’d had to fill General Organa’s shoes and rebuild the Rebellion through the dirtiest means at his disposal because her way, his own mother’s way hadn’t worked. Her way had gotten her and so many others killed. As soon as the news had come back, he hadn’t been entirely sure he wasn’t going to go to Ben and plea for mercy. If he’d thought for even one, wild moment Ben would grant it, he probably would have.

It would have been the cowardly choice, but as he watched that shuttle coming in, he wasn’t sure it wasn’t the preferable one.

The fact that they were about to win the war hardly seemed to matter. It didn’t even register to Poe, not in the way it did for the compliment of Rebellion soldiers at his back. They held blasters that could turn the lot of them into a firing squad and they slept easy at night. And they bit back barely concealed smiles because this was it. This was the end of the line for them; after this, they’ll get to go back home to their families and friends. They’ll be heroes. Their excitement turned the air around Poe into a vibrating mass that only made him sick to his stomach. Or maybe that was just Poe’s imagination. Regardless, he heard their titters, the scuffle of their boots as they tripped all over themselves to reach the landing zone but not ahead of Poe, no. Poe had earned the right to reach it first.

What will Poe become after today?

He didn’t want to know. But there was a missive sitting in his office on an encrypted pad that told him how today was going to end and in no uncertain terms. If Poe didn’t fulfill his end of the bargain, he’d be on the hook for everything, his Resistance turned into a scapegoat. Maybe it wasn’t fair of the burgeoning New Republic leadership to do that while they rebuilt from safety, the Resistance serving as a distraction for and a blockade against the First Order and if Poe didn’t do as he was told. But it was what they’d done.

He’d spent the morning acquainting himself with the ‘fresher as he worked through the ramifications of these last, most damning orders. He’d made his decision as soon as he got up and splashed cold water on his face, but even so. Even so, his mind screamed at him that this was wrong. They couldn’t do this to him. The Resistance had saved the New Republic. It was Poe who should have been making demands, pulling favors, forcing terms.

It was what General Organa would have done, he thought. She could have gotten herself out of this mess. Or Poe.

Instead.

Instead and instead and instead.

End this war now, he’d been told instead, or your people will be facing steep punishments for it when they came home. Lengthy, costly trials. Even if they were found innocent, they’d be ruined. If another life, Resistance, New Republic, or even First Order, was lost after today, on Poe’s head it would be.

The Resistance, after all, had never been a sanctioned New Republic military organization, not before General Organa leaned so heavily on the past and rebranded them as the Rebellion of old and definitely not after. The words ‘war crimes tribunals’ had been thrown around often enough in the report that Poe could only imagine the politicians back in the capital—Hanna City again, and oh, how proud Mon Mothma would have been, he thought—salivating over the possibility. They would have loved to pin every bit of blame for the conflict on the Resistance if they could. Worse, they had good grounds to push a lot of it.

How easy it would be to twist the responsibility for the destruction of the Hosnian system back onto the Resistance’s shoulders. It wasn’t like the galaxy thought highly of the Resistance, not after General Hux had so kindly and explicitly tied the Resistance to the New Republic’s senate. And how much easier, then, to pin everything else on them, too, when the public was so ready to embrace that reading.

Poe couldn’t let this happen. He wouldn’t. A lot of good people gave their lives and more to the cause of freedom in the galaxy, had joined the cause even when it was unpopular. This last demand… he would be the one to shoulder this. He might even be able to make peace with it one day. At least it will be over.

If he was very lucky.

Poe knew he was not very lucky. Hadn’t been in a very long time. Luck might have followed him around earlier in his career, but that well had long since run dry.

The shuttle was now touching down and Poe put up his hand to stop his soldiers from moving any further toward it. Hot air blasted them until the thrusters finally disengaged and the shuttle was silent. It was long, long moments until the hatch opened. But finally it did and out of it stepped Ben, shackled and manacled to within an inch of his life, the most prominent one being a device locked tight around his throat.

Force-suppressant technology. It rubbed the skin of his neck red.

Rey stood at his side, grim, her hands behind her back. Her eyes surveyed Poe, the camdroids, the soldiers, the vast stretch of Resistance fighters scattered further afield. Finally her gaze returned to Poe’s face and there he saw nothing but his own grief reflected back at him. He flinched first. Couldn’t look at her any more. What was the point when he would see nothing there that would help him get through the next few minutes? Finn, finishing up with landing procedures, hung back in the hatch, leaning against the bulkhead. He was steadier, grown the most reliable of all of them. It was a little easier to hold his gaze and take heart.

Poe flexed his hand, tightened it into a fist. Licked his lips and breathed out.

He could only avoid looking at Ben for so long, Ben who was and wasn’t Kylo Ren, who’d been defeated and left to rot until political expediency decided his fate for him. He wished for the time when he could think of Ben as Kylo Ren alone. That would have made this easier. He could at least pretend this was nothing more nor less than what it was: retribution for the heinous crimes he’d committed.

There was regret in Ben’s eyes, the same sadness Poe remembered from long ago, even before this descent into madness that they shared between them. Ben had always been on the melancholy side, lonely, hard to reach. But Poe’d reached him once and, in turn, Poe’d gotten to be who he was, who he’d wanted to be. A pilot, a daredevil, a show-off, a jerk sometimes; he’d liked himself more when he managed to make Ben smile. Earning Ben’s love and trust had been a worthy goal, an accomplishment few other things could touch outside of a cockpit. It was hard work, caring for Ben, and they’d never told one another enough, but…

But now Poe wished he’d said it all a whole lot sooner. Maybe none of this would have happened if Ben had always known the true extent of Poe’s regard for him.

Ben wasn’t smiling now. He was just as quick as he’d always been, though. His eyes dropped to the blaster at Poe’s side and understanding flashed like lightning across his face. To his credit, it only seemed to startle him for a moment. And then he didn’t seem surprised at all, just more sad as he dug up an infinitely deep well’s worth of it. When he was close enough to speak, he said, “I’m sorry,” and Poe almost slapped him for it. Anger poured through him, scalding hot, threatened to blister his skin as he stood there. It was all well and good that Ben was sorry. Ben could be sorry. All Poe could be right now was a puppet, his arm controlled by the strings of the government he’d sworn to protect, that he believed in, somewhere beneath all the betrayal he was feeling now.

Never before had he felt like he was just a weapon, an object, to be used and set aside when he’d filled his role.

He wondered if this was what Ben used to feel like before he destroyed Snoke. He wondered if this was why Ben was so apologetic.

Poe turned and looked at the soldiers behind him, gestured them back even further. He wanted as much privacy for this as he could get. If he could’ve shot the camdroids from the sky, he would have done that, too, but they were recording this for posterity, for the politicians back home, for the people who wouldn’t believe this nightmare was over until their greatest bogeyman was dead.

“It’s too late for that,” Poe said, uncertain whether the droids were taking audio as well. He should have checked that. Not that it mattered. Nothing he said now would damn him more than his actions already would.

“It’s not,” Ben answered.

And damn him for arguing. He couldn’t take back what he did and he deserved to pay for it, but not like this. Not with Poe having to be the one to suffer the consequences. Maybe that was selfish, but Poe could’ve lived his life happily knowing Ben was stuck in some prison somewhere, serving out his time until the end of time if necessary. At least he’d be alive.

At least he’d not have died at Poe’s hand.

Poe blinked and tried to stop his eyes from prickling. He’d somehow managed this whole time to keep from shedding tears and he didn’t want that to change now. Not even when that seemed like the only reasonable option available to him. Instead he sniffed and stared at the sky. “In all of this, I never hated you more than I do right now, did you know that?”

Ben shook his head. Gesturing as best he could at the Force-suppressing device around his neck, all he succeeded in doing was rattling the chains he was dragging around with him. “I can’t read your mind anymore.”

“You don’t need the Force to know what I’m thinking.”

Ben tilted his head. “Maybe not before,” he admitted. “But things change.”

All Poe could do at that was bark out a laugh, bitter and cold. No fucking kidding things change. But people? Poe wasn’t convinced. Otherwise, he might have pulled out every piece of himself that was Poe Dameron and replace them with someone who could do what had to be done. “I haven’t changed all that much,” he said, as close as he might ever get to admitting how he still felt about Ben. “If I’m being entirely honest.”

“And you’re nothing if not that, right?”

There were, Poe realized, some things in the galaxy more important than his cowardice. This was one of them. If he was going to do this thing, he had to… he couldn’t leave this unresolved. “Yes, Ben. I’m being entirely honest right now.”

Ben’s shoulders slumped and he was the one to look away first this time. It should’ve been a win of some sort, but all Poe felt was loss. “Yeah,” he replied. “Me, too. That never really changed.”

“And you’re sorry now.”

“Yes.”

What would it have been like if things could have been different? How would their lives have gone if they’d just gotten to be who they were? Together?

“I don’t blame you,” Ben said. “I always knew it would end like this.”

“You might have clued me in on that. Saved us both some trouble.”

“It doesn’t have to be you.”

A tear spilled across his cheek, hot and tickling, and Poe brushed it aside as quickly as he could. Not quickly enough that Ben didn’t see it though. “Stars damn you, Ben.”

Striding forward, Poe grabbed Ben by the front of his shirt, pulled him into a tight hug. Ben tensed under his touch and that only made Poe pull him closer, hold him that much tighter. Somewhere on Chandrila, the politicians were probably losing their minds, thinking Poe had lost his, but he wouldn’t let them take this from him when he was already taking so much from himself just by agreeing to this. Though he held Ben by the shoulder with one arm, fingers digging hard into his muscles, he freed the clasp on his holster, pulled his blaster. That sound would never leave him. He was sure of it.

Ben relaxed at it, though, surprising Poe with how compliant he was being, how accepting. “It’s okay, you know,” he said, low, into Poe’s ear. For him alone. The camdroids wouldn’t pick up on that.

He hid his face in Ben’s neck so he wouldn’t have to worry about how he might have looked to Ben in that moment, what Ben might have seen and what he might see in return. Better to imagine they were just reuniting after a long time apart as Poe held the blaster against Ben’s side. It was as merciful as he could be with so many people watching.

Maybe it would be—

“I’m glad it’s over.”

Okay.


End file.
